Can one deem what is important and not important to share?

iloveitihateit

New member
My boyfriend and I are in a married-like relationship (not married by choice, but we are life partners). We are in an open relationship where we are allowed to do anything except intercourse. We are relatively new to the lifestyle, so there hasn't been too many people.

We have been to swingers clubs. I'm bisexual, and he is straight. The clubs have been fine and fun, but the problem is non-club situations and getting to know others one on one.

I keep hitting a ceiling in our communication about what details to the other. There are some details that I think are important to know, but he prefers to not provide details where he doesn't think they are important.

His solution is: Ask me anything about the night. If I can't come up with a question addresses what is important to me, it's not important.

My solution is: To try to understand why certain details are not important to tell, when they would be important to me. And try to come up with a solution based on that.

----

Here are issues:

1) He leaves out certain details about a situation regarding a person he is into, and he feels it is unimportant to tell me. High-level details are the only things he thinks I should know.

A month ago it started out as: I'm attracted to her and I think she could be a thing.
Now it's: I think I might be more into her and she could become a thing.

2) Some of those details I sometimes discover second-handed and I felt that they were important to tell me because it shows an attempt to connect and bond with that someone.

I discovered: He attempted to try to kiss her the other night.

He was talking about it with someone else in a message thread, but he never once told me about it.

I was hurt and sad that he never told me anything about it, yet he so freely spoke about it with others. To me it is an attempt to connect and bond with someone else, and that's important for me to know. To him, the conversation was in total passing and the kiss attempt wasn't a significant moment not warranted to talk about. Thus, it's irrelevant for me to even feel sad.

This happened a lot with the last girl he was seeing. I was getting sad and upset that he would relinquish details that were important to me, but he keeps telling me that they are not important and that I shouldn't be emotional about it.

The emotional part is important because seeing that I'm making a big deal out of something he doesn't feel is a big deal makes it very hard to talk about. He becomes reactive and angry, I become less wanting to talk about it.

He tells me I need to be less emotional about things that are not important. Maybe they aren't important? How to I become less emotional about it?

I'm trying to have civil conversations about it all, but every time I say it makes me sad all he thinks about is how he's hurting me and abusing me. But, he isn't... I just want to have the conversation.

I simply want to know how we can have a balance between not asking and asking. What should I know, what shouldn't I know? How can I not be so emotional with not knowing? How can I get him to learn what is important to tell me if he's not willing to tell me anyway? How can I learn how to deal with my feelings if I am just kept in the dark anyway?

I'm hoping some of you can shed some insight. I'm really lost and hurt because each situation keeps escalating.
 
I'm inclined to say that what is important and what is private is a matter of
a) making agreements based on understanding each others preferences
b) trial and error.
If things are improving, it's a process, hang in there. If not... a different approach to seeking a solution is in place.

And please don't be ashamed about feelings. Remember - you don't control emotions, you only control how you react to them.
 
Last edited:
Like Tinwen said, what/how much to share is highly dependent on the individuals in the relationship. My experience is that it also changes over time. In the early days, I wanted to know as much as Blue was willing to share. Over time, I found that I needed/wanted much less information....except when the other partner/relationship was really pinging my insecurities/fears...then I wanted more information.

Assuming your partner has shown himself to be trustworthy, then I think you could trust that if he says something is unimportant (like the kiss), then you can believe that it really was unimportant to him, even if it feels important to you.
 
I am sorry you struggle.

I see three problems here.

1) Communication about the original problem about you guys dating other people -- WHAT is "newsworthy" to tell, and WHEN/HOW MUCH to tell.

2) Dealing with emotions

3) Dealing with meta-communication. (Talking about HOW you communicate/communication styles.)


COMMUNICATION

I'm trying to have civil conversations about it all,but every time I say it makes me sad all he thinks about is how he's hurting me and abusing me. But, he isn't... I just want to have the conversation.

If you saying you feel sad derails the conversation from where you want it to go? Skip it. I greyed it out. You can STOP telling him you feel sad in this conversation. Have one conversation topic at a time.

If the main topic is "figure out what is important and when to tell" -- stick to the main topic. Don't go off on side topics. Save having those other conversations for a later time. Maybe you would have more success doing one conversation at a time instead of several topics at once.

He attempted to try to kiss her the other night.

He was talking about it with someone else in a message thread, but he never once told me about it.

I was hurt and sad that he never told me anything about it, yet he so freely spoke about it with others. To me it is an attempt to connect and bond with someone else, and that's important for me to know. To him, the conversation was in total passing and the kiss attempt wasn't a significant moment not warranted to talk about. Thus, it's irrelevant for me to even feel sad.

I think you guys might have this conversation better if you stop telling him how you feel for now. Stick to one topic. If the important thing is the telling? Focus on that.

Just tell him what is "newsworthy" to you and what is "not newsworthy" and when "the window for telling" is to you.

He can do the same back.

And hopefully you can figure out where the compromise place is so both you you feel free enough to explore things with other people, but also feel "in the loop" enough.

Perhaps use this list as a guideline for that conversation.

http://openingup.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Open-Relationship-Checklist-OU.pdf

You can also see if the other worksheets help with this conversation.
http://openingup.net/resources/free-downloads-from-opening-up/

Perhaps approaching it as "green light, yellow light, red light" stuff helps you to get what you want across better in a way he can understand that isn't "so emotional" to him.

Not that you having emotions is bad or wrong. And you can certainly ask for emotional support/help from a partner. Just that right now when you are trying to make agreements about what is "news" and "how/when to tell the news"? Focus on asking one thing at a time.

When you look at the checklist...

  • What's "green light" stuff? Flirting? Kissing? Totally ok to do without telling right away or ever. (To me? I don't care about flirting or hugging or even a little kissing. I don't need to know every little detail thing. I only want to be given a heads up when something is "looking to go lover." )

  • What's "yellow light" stuff? Mostly ok to do, but proceed with caution. ( To me? Other activities that require more thinking about using birth control and safer sex practices are "go slow." Perhaps limit to outercourse until a round of clean labs before moving on to intercourse things or talking about fluid bonding. )

  • What's "red light" stuff? Stop and tell first, before going there. (To me? I would have a problem with spouse planning more kids with someone else without telling me!)

You have to figure out what your red, yellow, and green things are. He can figure out his. Then compare. Come to some kind of agreement for now.

Figure out which things might be hard limits -- that you will NEVER change your mind on. Having more kids? That's a hard limit to me. I will ALWAYS want to know that ahead of time. It is not something I would ever be "oh sure, have whatever kids you want with other people. I don't need to know that stuff."

Figure out which things might be soft limits -- that are no for now, but could change over time. Fluid bonding is like that to me. I wouldn't want him fluid bonding with someone on the first date. That would be a total turn off to me. But a long term partner I could be ok with.


EMOTIONS

The emotional part is important because seeing that I'm making a big deal out of something he doesn't feel is a big deal makes it very hard to talk about. He becomes reactive and angry, I become less wanting to talk about it.

Well, if he's not comfortable? The solution is to say "I am not comfortable with emotional conversation." Not blow up so you shut up. That does not help create trust/emotional safety in a relationship.

In the moment? Just see the anger. "I see this conversation is inspiring anger. How about taking a time out? I can check back in an hour and we can set a time/date to continue the conversation later next week. Does that work for you?"

Later you could ask him what provokes this anger response. See if you can change your start up or see if he can express anger more constructively rather than using it to shut conversation down.

He tells me I need to be less emotional about things that are not important. Maybe they aren't important? How to I become less emotional about it?

You are allowed to feel what you feel. And the things that are important to you are important to you.

You could say something like "I know X is small to you. It is important to me. Could you be willing to do it anyway and contribute to my well being?"

Because if the thing really IS small to him... what's the big deal in just doing it for your sake or even just for the sake of not having these merry-go-round conversations about it? :confused: It might not be important to him, but he could acknowledge that it matters to you.

A month ago it started out as: I'm attracted to her and I think she could be a thing.
Now it's: I think I might be more into her and she could become a thing.

What is the difference between those two statements? To me they are the same "I'm dating a potential."

Would it be easier to deal with emotionally if you just assume that he will try to bond/connect with his potentials? And part of that dating/connecting with them will include stuff like hugging, flirting, and kissing?

Because if you get upset over small things like a kiss, what's your emotional resilience/endurance going to be for the long haul going to be like?

If you guys JUST opened up, I could see you mourning the loss of exclusivity or the old model. While enjoying what the new model brings. But if you are both dating other people... eventually you are gonna have to expect "dating other people activities" to happen.

METACOMMUNICATION

My spouse takes things personally and starts wigging out if I am wigging out. He feels overly responsible for my feelings because his mother would make all her kids responsible for "mind reader-ing" her real feelings. She would say one thing, and you were supposed to mind reader what she REALLY meant. So all the kids have grown up pussyfooting around trying to figure out what she really means, and if she was mad and going to take it out on you or what.

So... if he sees me wigging out? He gets anxious. He tells me I'm not wigging out or something doesn't really matter in an attempt to protect himself from any potential blow up raining down on his head.

At MY house, my Dad would tell us things like "You are too sensitive" or "You are being emotional" in an attempt to dismiss us/shut us up. So the quickest way to PISS ME OFF is to tell me how I'm feeling/not feeling. I'm the only one in here inside my brain. Only I know how I feel. Someone else cannot tell me how I feel.

I want to EXPRESS myself. That's HOW I deal with emotions -- I express them and let them out safely. I do not bottle them up and gunnysack. That's also how I let others know what matters to me. I'm a straight up person. I tell. There's no secret messages "between the lines" and I don't need "mind reader-ing." That kind of behavior drives me crazy. I expect to be believed at my Word.

So in our previous communication style we would end up inadvertently triggering and re-triggering each other. Or wind up in the pissing contest.

  • "I had a bad day! I hate the dishes!"
  • "You think you had a bad day? I had a bad day. I mowed the lawn and found a wasp nest!"

Neither was getting comfort that was needed and it would becoming a thing about trying to top the other one -- escalating louder, trying to be HEARD and finally be comforted.

We did this module a while back: http://msue.anr.msu.edu/uploads/236/64484/MOD_3_LISTENING_TO_FACE_VOICE_AND_BODY.pdf

And we learned that before we have conversation that might be emotionally charged to state up front what is needed.

"I had a bad day and I need to vent. Then I want you to say "There there, poor baby." That is the correct response. Could you be willing to do that? After that if you have something you would like from me , I am willing to hear your request."​

Then he knew I wasn't going to blow up and blame him and rain things on his head like everything is his fault so he felt emotionally safe listening.

Then I felt emotionally safe expressing and not worrying that he was going to try to shut my emotions down in some way or start a pissing contest. I would get the validation I needed with the "There, there poor baby."

Then if HE wanted to take a turn to unload I was in a better frame of mind to do the same support for him.

I don't know if any of that helps you any.

GL!

Galagirl
 
Last edited:
Hi iloveitihateit,

I think you are having an ongoing argument with your boyfriend about whose reality is the objective reality. In this argument, the loser is whoever has the subjective reality. "You think this is important, but it's not *really* important. I have the right idea of what's *really* important." I would suggest that the objective reality is that we're *all* subjective. You have one standard for "important" (what's important to you), and he has another standard for "important" (what's important to him). Neither of you is right or wrong. You just have your own ways of experiencing reality.

The thing, then, to do, is ask him if he would tell you certain things simply because you want him to, not because it's important or unimportant, but because it's important *to you.* Even if it's not important to him, it's important to you and you would like him to inform you of it for that reason. Then be clear about what you mean. For example, "An attempted kiss is important *to me.* Please tell me about attempted kisses because it's important to me." If he says, "No," or, "I don't care if it's important to you," then you have a different kind of problem on your hands. Namely, that he doesn't respect what's important to you, even if you admit it's subjective. You may get to the point where you consider breaking up with him. But we aren't at that point, at least not yet.

These are some of my thoughts and impressions.
Sincerely,
Kevin T.
 
You will probably not like my reply.

the problem is non-club situations and getting to know others one on one.

I think part of the problem is micro-analyzing it. Will point to specific example further below.

I keep hitting a ceiling in our communication about what details to the other. There are some details that I think are important to know, but he prefers to not provide details where he doesn't think they are important.

His solution is: Ask me anything about the night. If I can't come up with a question addresses what is important to me, it's not important.

My solution is: To try to understand why certain details are not important to tell, when they would be important to me. And try to come up with a solution based on that.

Part of me is rolling my eyes and wondering just how much you can discuss what to discuss in a situation that is already dating and short of intercourse. That pretty much guarantees something of the sort of met, talked, maybe touched, maybe kissed, maybe a bit more. If there is something specific you feel like sharing, share. If you need to know something, ask. If there are serious things being concealed, call each other out.

But if you get into these kinds of detailed handlings over just how much contact they had or didn't, etc, it is going to kill spontaneity between the two of you and just make you wary/suspicious of each other. I hear it already in your post.

And it may not even be intentional. Sometimes you just describe what stayed in your mind most about a meeting rather than a report of your actions. Would you want to know what he found special about her, or a dead log of actions? Then you have to accept that maybe one time he found some hilarious happening more worth talking about than a kiss and not create a fuss over it. I can't offhand give an exact account of what all my boyfriend and I did last time we were together. But I do remember he spontaneously sang me a song. ;)

1) He leaves out certain details about a situation regarding a person he is into, and he feels it is unimportant to tell me. High-level details are the only things he thinks I should know.

A month ago it started out as: I'm attracted to her and I think she could be a thing.
Now it's: I think I might be more into her and she could become a thing.

I don't actually see a difference between then and now. I have a lover I'm committed to and some days what I feel for him is "He's useful for reaching high shelves" and other days it is "I can't live without this man". If one is to be honest, some days you wax eloquent, other days, you just grunt a comment. Such is life, such are relationships.

If you're looking to get more details about their time together, understand this - intimate revelations are directly proportional to comfort level. And the more you care about a person, the more potential disapproval DISCOURAGES sharing. If he's ready to flinch over how you'll critique his sharing, he isn't exactly going to want to tell you a lot. He just wants it over without incident. If you're willing to accept what he says and give him the space he needs, he may think of something he'd like to share a while later. Or he may not. But demanding cannot create intimacy. If you want intimate sharing, you have to create a safe space for it to happen. Or it won't. It will feel like a violation. People often talk of the privacy of the other partner, but my genuine belief is that it is a violation of the self to be forced to speak something intimate when you don't feel ready to share it.

I am abrupt and asocial and hostile to most people, but if anything I overshare with Spexy. I can happily chatter his ears off. Because he has never - not once - judged whatever I choose to share against some scale. He treasures my sharing and thus me. Accepts me as I am in all my moods talkative and descriptive, or disinterest in discussing. I am trying to think what he'd do if I shared too little info. He'd probably see my disinterest as a comment that I didn't find much in it worth commenting on. If he needs to know something, he asks - and I reply easily, because the reason holds importance to him beyond "making me tell" - I'm not his daughter. I'm his partner.

2) Some of those details I sometimes discover second-handed and I felt that they were important to tell me because it shows an attempt to connect and bond with that someone.

I discovered: He attempted to try to kiss her the other night.

How does it matter? They are attracted to each other. Obviously they will kiss at some point. What's the big deal? A relationship isn't a checklist of actions to break down and want accounts of. And it can't be discussed like that, frankly, in my view. That would be like an accountant writing poetry.

He was talking about it with someone else in a message thread, but he never once told me about it.

This should tell you something. That he is not averse to talking about it.

I was hurt and sad that he never told me anything about it, yet he so freely spoke about it with others.

More on the "sad" below. This is going to sound very brutal, but I wouldn't be able to take this at all. If a partner thought he were so entitled to me that I could not even choose who I spoke what to without a guilt trip, I'd dump him. Point blank.

I am a person. Not a possession. I share with my partner because talking to him lets me relive the joy or halve the concerns. Not because he has first right to dissect my brain before I talk to anyone else.

To me it is an attempt to connect and bond with someone else, and that's important for me to know.

So why aren't you sounding connected? Why aren't you even sounding like it is okay for him to have a comfor/discomfort scale about very personal experiences? To me it is sounding like an attempt to control him.

To him, the conversation was in total passing and the kiss attempt wasn't a significant moment not warranted to talk about. Thus, it's irrelevant for me to even feel sad.

I don't know him, or what actually happened, but he is basically saying he has nothing to tell you and you are not taking that "NO" for an answer. In his place, I'd be wary too, if my partner created incident reports of my romantic interactions. Sometimes things are too ... delicate to put into concrete. I ogled a gym instructor recently. Gleefully told Spexy about it. Wasn't even a date or even interaction beyond "exercise" level. I just liked him. For a week after that, he asked me how the instructor was doing when I got back from the gym. Replies were "Still prince" "Still prince" "May turn out to be frog and I didn't even kiss" "huh? he's ok" "lol. I missed noticing him" - I didn't have to explain ANY of them unless *I* was in the mood to talk about it. But if he'd asked me "So, is he attractive? What did you talk about? Did you talk one on one with him? Privately?" I'd probably reply "you're reading too much into it" and that would shut down the conversation. Because there really weren't these sort of details to put into concrete. But it was delicious while it lasted, and was fun telling Spexy about it too.

This happened a lot with the last girl he was seeing. I was getting sad and upset that he would relinquish details that were important to me, but he keeps telling me that they are not important and that I shouldn't be emotional about it.

Why are you sad if he is seeing someone? Are you being forced into a poly relationship? This sadness is important to address, because it is actually your business in this whole mess. What is the sadness about?

My guess is that you'd like more attention from him. Not putting it into too many words, since you haven't talked about it, but I think you should consider putting into words what you need from him in your relationship. All the descriptions in the world won't work if what you want is really for him to make a big fuss of you and give you loads of affection or sex or whatever.

The emotional part is important because seeing that I'm making a big deal out of something he doesn't feel is a big deal makes it very hard to talk about. He becomes reactive and angry, I become less wanting to talk about it.

That is because you are covering your problems by dissecting him. If you need his attention, affection, etc, you should address that instead of poking him over and over with demands for invasive details.

Not commenting on rest of post because I think this is too much advice for one post.

I think you are being disrespectful of his personhood and privacy. You are being controlling. You have insecurities that you are not addressing and probably compensating in this manner. Addressing what you need directly and accepting that he is not inclined to discuss deeply personal experiences at the moment will make you happier.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top